The Political Institutions and Theories of the Hindus: A Study in Comparative Politics c12.s1.t3.28

c12.s1.t3.28

It is evident that few, if any, of these republics had their jurisdiction confined to single villages or cities like the ordinary commonwealths of Greece or the town states of Hansa. The *gaṇas* have, generally speaking, to be treated not in terms of thousands of citizens, but of millions and not in terms of scores of square miles, but of hundreds or thousands. The Sâkiya and Vajji states should accordingly have to be understood as bearing resemblance to the Athenian republic of Attica (or the Periclean “empire” of Athens) and the “dominion of a city over cities”